Resistance and Rescue

The authentic Schindler’s List is presented in this gallery, which deals with Jewish resistance, rescue attempts, and the Righteous Among the Nations.

This gallery opens with an attempt to answer the requisite question of what the world knew and when. It describes how the world was mute when the Struma-a decrepit ship carrying 769 refugees en-route to the Land of Israel was turned back from the coast of Turkey, towed out to sea without fuel, food or water and torpedoed within hours, probably by a Soviet submarine that mistook it for an empty German ship. All but one refugee drowned.

All over Europe [throughout the Holocaust] there were many diverse expressions of Jewish defiance of Nazi rule, including rescue attempts. This gallery depicts life in the Jewish partisan family camps whose members combined fighting the Germans with the rescue of Jewish men, women, and children. The display demonstrates that Jews actively participated in almost all the resistance movements in Europe, either as members of non-Jewish organizations or in specifically Jewish underground movements such as those in France and Hungary.

Attempts to rescue Jews took many forms: collective efforts in Bulgaria and Denmark, the latter of which is represented by an authentic fishing boat from the Danish village of Gilleleje that was used to rescue Jews. Also included in this exhibit is an experiential display of the rescue of Jews in Le Chambon-sur-Lignon in France, and selected stories of individual Righteous Among the Nations who defied the indifference and hostility towards Jews that prevailed at the time.